In Bowling, Moore Strikes At Guns, Triggers Comedy

TODD ANTHONY FILM WRITER

October 20, 2002|By Todd Anthony Film Writer

TORONTO, CANADA — A series of deadly sniper attacks paralyzes the Washington, D.C. area. The news media descend on the nation's capital, bringing the rampage to the forefront of our collective consciousness. Could the timing possibly be better for a movie that hopes to jump-start a national dialogue on gun violence in America?

Michael Moore completed Bowling for Columbine, which opens Friday in South Florida, long before the latest shooter claimed his first victim. But the controversial filmmaker's pithy, provocative and frequently side-splitting documentary becomes more relevant with each new muzzle flash.

During an interview at the Toronto International Film Festival last month, Moore expounded upon Americans' bloody affinity for settling beefs with bullets.

"This ultimately isn't a film about guns, this ultimately really isn't a film about gun control," he said. "This is a film about the American psyche."

The title references another crushing case of guns and cold-blooded multiple murder. More than three years have passed since a pair of disaffected high school students in Littleton, Colo., massacred 12 classmates and a teacher. As a stunned nation struggled to make some sense of that slaughter, conservative pundits and politicians wasted little time impugning the usual scapegoats: Violent video games. Heavy metal music.

Moore fingers a different culprit: Bowling.

Hey, why not? On the night before their rampage, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold showed up at their favorite alley and rolled a few frames. As Moore facetiously asserts in Bowling for Columbine, at least as much circumstantial evidence links the teens' killing spree to their love of the pin game as to playing Doom or Marilyn Manson songs.

Given a chance to respond to his critics, the shock rocker emerges as one of the film's most thoughtful, compassionate and well-informed interview subjects.

"Marilyn Manson. One fine American. A voice of reason," Moore says with a satisfied smirk. While admitting that he doesn't go so far as to actually listen to the singer's music, the pudgy filmmaker had nothing but praise for the rail-thin, heavily made-up musician.

Manson's erudition is only one of the film's many eye-openers. Another is the revelation that liberal poster boy and former Mother Jones editor Moore, 47, is a card-carrying member of the NRA.

"Back when I was in Boy Scouts you automatically got a junior membership," he explained. "I won the NRA marksman award. Back then it was a gun safety group that promoted good sportsmanship, hunting and things like that. In recent years it has become a different organization with a very different agenda."

So different, in fact, that Moore considered running for presidency of the firearms lobby against Charlton Heston. "I figured they've got 4 million members," he said. "There's got to be at least 5 million Americans out of 280 million who would agree with my positions. If I could have gotten them to join for just the lowest membership rate and vote for me, I'd win. Then I'd turn it back into what it used to be -- a gun safety group."

When that gambit proved too daunting, the best-selling author (Stupid White Men), TV personality (The Awful Truth, TV Nation) and acclaimed participatory documentarian (Roger & Me) took up Bowling. Deadpan and impassioned, ironic and sincere, hilarious and heart-rending, the film is vintage Michael Moore. A runaway hit with festival audiences, it rolled strikes at the Cannes Film Festival in May, where Bowling for Columbine claimed a special 55th Anniversary Prize and became the first documentary in decades to play in the official competition.

Shocked speechless

But the filmmaker's decision not to challenge Heston for presidency of the gun lobby didn't let the aging actor off the hook. In his film, Moore denounces Heston's callous decision to headline a pro-gun rally in Littleton 11 days after the killings. At one point the unsuspecting NRA president invites the dumpy, rumpled king of confrontational journalism into his home to discuss his views.

In the film's most talked-about scene, Moses attributes America's problems with gun violence to "mixed ethnicity." A moment later he opines that, "Our country was founded by those wise, benevolent white guys."

Visibly stunned by the admission of bigotry, Moore, who rarely finds himself at a loss for words, holds his fire while Heston, sensing his gaffe, awkwardly backpedals.

"I think I was just too shocked," Moore theorizes about his reticence. "I really felt like, `Oh my God, he's having his Jimmy the Greek moment!' I felt bad for him. I wasn't going `Aha!' I was going, `Man, too many people look up to you. Why did you have to go there?' Which isn't saying a whole lot for me, frankly, because the comment deserves to be challenged and I should have challenged it."